


but it burns my tongue

by txilar



Category: Original Work
Genre: Community: smut_fest, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-21
Updated: 2014-04-21
Packaged: 2018-01-20 01:38:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,599
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1491988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/txilar/pseuds/txilar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tommy and Baptiste have been bonded as long as they both can remember. They were always together, and Tommy never thought anything of it until Baptiste was gone. Then he gets Baptiste back, and everything changes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	but it burns my tongue

**Author's Note:**

> Content & Warnings: A touch of hurt/comfort, mostly romance, some under the influence sex. Fairly casual mentions of drug use.
> 
> Written for [kianna_leigh](http://kianna-leigh.livejournal.com/) for [](http://smut-fest.livejournal.com/)smut_fest's Bonding Round.

_"I would be your dragon_  
 _clinging, as if it's love_  
 _Breathing fire but it burns my tongue"_  
Zulu Winter 

 

Baptiste was outside the gates when Tommy showed up. He was smoking. The cigarettes were clove, rolled dark, nearly hidden by his hair, but given away by tendrils of smoke. He didn't move when Tommy got out of the car, leaned over the top, smiling and waving. Baptiste just tilted his head and blew smoke out, like he was on a smoke break. Like this was their regular deal.

"You're late."

His eyes took Tommy in, but his face was still tilted to the sky. Clouds moved over the sun, polka-dotting the ground and Baptiste with it. Spotlight, shadows, bright light, dim, over and over.

"I missed you too."

At that, Baptiste looked down. He took another long drag, dropped the cigarette, and stepped on it. A paper bag sat beside him, rolled up like a lunch bag. He picked it up and walked over to the car, through the whispering smoke that remained.

"Fuck this place. Take me home, T." He got in, and Tommy kept smiling, staring over the car at nothing. At the fifteen foot chain link fence. At the prison. At the flat land that just went on and on and on.

Baptiste was home.

 

\- - -

 

Tommy looked sleek and modern, like he'd stepped out of a magazine. He could roll out of bed and pull on a trash bag and he'd still look like he belonged on a magazine cover. Bedroom eyes, and a tall, slim build that just came natural to him.

It was chilly out, but Baptiste tried not to shiver in his state-issued sweatshirt. The car was warming up. It was half nauseating and half numbing, the drone of the road, and the blur of scenery. It was amazing what had sprung up along the highway in three years.

"Got any music?"

"Just for you." Tommy pressed a button and pounding death metal filled the car.

That was good. He didn't want anything with memories attached to it right now, good or bad. Baptiste leaned back and tried to relax, but every muscle in his body felt like a coiled spring. Rusted, but taut.

 

\- - -

 

"You look good, man. Cut. You work out?" It was hard enough driving without touching Baptiste, to make sure he was real. He had to work at not looking at him, keeping his eyes on the road. But he wanted to. He wanted to stare. Drink him in like ice cold beer. Inhale him into his lungs and drift on the high. Three years of looking at each other through plate glass with only one face-to-face and "hey, no touching!" had taken its toll.

Baptiste shook his head. His hair was long. It didn't look like he'd cut it in three years. It'd been in a tight braid every time he'd visited, but today it was long and loose. Tommy liked it.

"Not much else to do. Play chess for cigarettes. Read. Got some ink."

"You didn't join a gang? Prayer group? Choir?"

Baptiste gave him the finger, leaning over to get his hand in front of Tommy's face. Tommy laughed.

"I have to report within twenty-four hours. Address, anybody living there, any and all bonds, and I have to have a sponsor for--"

"I got it. We're good. You want something to eat?" Tommy signalled and headed toward the main highway. "We got a three hour drive."

Baptiste leaned back, looking out the window. "Nah. I just want to take a shower _alone_ , and enjoy some goddamn quiet."

Tommy nodded. "I got quiet for you. I work downtown so I'm in a company sponsored unit. It's super elite, so it's quiet. And it's in a trendy zone, so hipsters, zombies, squares, and tricks all in one place. Mod bars next to goth bars, jazz in the streets. Cowboys and rappers puking in the alleys together."

Baptiste's eyes were closed, so Tommy rambled on until the next exit. In the three years Baptiste had been locked up, Tommy had gone from part-time cook, alley code-breaker, and skateboarder to lead NLI programmer at his uncle's tech integration company.

Now, instead of cooking oil and decks interrupting him, he dreamt solely of code. Sometimes he dreamt of Baptiste. Reprogramming him. Once, disturbingly, of impregnating him.

He couldn't tell Baptiste that, though. Their bond was official, but it wasn't sexual. It had been set before they were ten years old and was completely platonic. A regular buddy-bond, nothing more.

Tommy's father had been resistant, but the teacher had persuaded him. "It'll be good for them. We try to pair opposites, but in this case, it's for the best." Tommy remembered the teacher's embarrassed laugh. "And after all, they're sort of opposites!"

Later, in hushed conference with all four parents, she said "They aren't getting along with the other boys." Tommy knew he wasn't supposed to be listening to that part, but the low voices piqued his interest. He was selling collectable bottle caps fitted with miniature data recorders at inflated prices. Baptiste was being teased and getting into fights. Neither one of them wore their uniform 'respectfully' and the other kids, well, kids heard things from their parents. Whatever. It had been the start of a beautiful friendship: a shared dislike of those around them.

Nine years later administrators tried to break their bond, but it was too late. Fighting, scamming, wheeling and dealing--

"Hey, we're here." He reached out and shook Baptiste's sleeve. Baptiste jerked upright and grabbed Tommy's wrist, shoving him away, bringing his fist up defensively. He was wide-eyed and breathing fast as he looked around, struggling with the seat-belt, back against the door.

"The fuck?"

"Hey," Tommy pulled his hands back slowly and pulled the door in to stop the beeping. The garage made everything echo louder. He kept his hands where Baptiste could see them. "We're home. You okay? You want to go inside?"

Baptiste took a deep breath, looking down, and nodded. "I'm fine. Yeah, let's go."

 

\- - -

 

It took three days and five showers before he felt like the smell was off of him. Tommy's place smelled woody and sweet, fancy incense his mom brought back from their island holiday. It helped, but Baptiste still felt sweaty and unclean. He was roaming the kitchen when Tommy called out about the party tomorrow night.

"I don't know. I'm not sure a party is the best idea, I mean, who's going to want to see me? I pissed 'em all off." He wandered back into the salon. Tommy was right. It wasn't a big place, but it was certainly bigger than a cell.

Tommy shook his head from where he sat on the sofa, long legs stretched out, crossed at the ankles. A book was face down on his belly. "It's not like that. I told you. You still have friends. Keep your hair down like that, you'll have girls, if nothing else."

Baptiste frowned at Tommy and wandered off again. Tommy might be zen-calm these days, but he couldn't sit still. He walked into the dining room again. There was a nice table and chairs, but Tommy was using it as an office. It was ridiculously neat, even the magazines and catalogues were lined up. Baptiste had always been messy, but three years of incarceration had changed that. Once, he'd have grabbed the stack and thumbed through it out of boredom. Now? He didn't want to disturb the clean lines.

Tommy was still tip-toeing around him. Nothing was wrong with him. The moment in the car. He was startled, that was all. He just wasn't ready for a party.

Tommy wouldn't push though. Tommy never pushed.

What the others would do, he couldn't say.

 

\- - -

 

"C'mon, have a beer, this is a party, man." He didn't even know the guy pushing the beer into Baptiste's hands, but Baptiste was smooth. If he was rattled, it didn't show. He nodded his thanks, took it, but he didn't drink it.

"I'm good."

"Oh, Tiste, your hair, you should be on a magazine cover." Girls were crowded around him. Tommy knew that would happen. Those girls lost it for the long-haired. Tommy had been half worried they'd mistreat him the minute they walked through the doors, but it looked like the opposite had happened: he was their prison celebrity now. After all was said and done, Tommy wasn't sure he liked it.

"What was it like inside? Did you--"

"Shanya, come on, we're welcoming him home, not reminding him of where's been." Tommy slung his arm around Baptiste and drew him away from Shanya. She was already giving him The Look. They moved to another table--new girls. They didn't know how things went down, where Baptiste had been. The last thing he needed was questions or accusations.

Baptiste had a beer. The music got louder, Tommy had some beers, and before long, everyone was loose and soft. The lights were crazy, and it was a proper party.

They were never far from each other, but Tommy let Baptiste wander, mingle, dance. He kept an eye on him--made sure no one pressed him, pushed issues, dug up old hurts, but he let Baptiste go. Habits were hard to break, but Tommy had to make sure there was no tension. Once Baptiste got a few more beers in him, his body lost that tight, coiled rigidity and went fluid.

Tommy's loose-limbed, serpentine Baptiste was slowly re-surfacing.

And they might have been platonic, but that didn't mean he couldn't appreciate what rolled in front of him. Lately, too much, maybe.

Tommy shook his head and had another drink. Baptiste was having something stronger than drinks. He could feel it. Maybe it was the pulsing pound of music, the swirl of lights and colours, or just the occasional steamy swirl of smoke and acrid haze, but somehow, he could feel it in his blood. Baptiste was high.

Suddenly Baptiste was there, right there beside him. They'd come out of the toilet stall together, had another drink, and then found themselves pressed against two fine sisters with huge breasts and dark eyes, dancing. Tommy turned away for a second, _one second_ and Baptiste was licking something off the back of the sister with gold eyeliner and go-go boots' hand, smiling. The smile turned to laughter and it was infectious and they all laughed, a tight circle on the dance floor. Tommy felt Baptiste's high, and it really _was_ a party then.

 

\- - -

 

He was safe with Tommy. This time, he was safe.

And it'd been so long, that it didn't take much. He felt cloudy and high, not just _high_ high, but, literally high, like he was floating, over everything, and was only barely tethered to the ground, to the club, to the very earth. He said something, or started too, laughed, and answered voices, things, people he knew weren't there. They smiled, and he smiled back.

Suddenly Tommy-- _Tommy_ \--caught his arms and maybe they'd been talking, he wasn't sure. He just felt so damn good and now, he could finally relax. Tommy was still talking.

"You see? Everything is code. From your television, your car, right down the bonds in our head. I mean, your toaster oven. It's code. _Everything is code._ Code is everything."

"You're high." Baptiste smiled. Tommy didn't usually get high or, at least, not too often. When he did, it was like he could see behind the curtain. The curtain of code that separated him from reprogramming _everything_. Thank god it was finally his job, not just a hobby. He'd read a book about code in the prison library. Really basic stuff, but completely beyond him.

They were connected in ways he didn't even understand, but sometimes, especially right now, he thought maybe he knew exactly what the bond between them was, and it wasn't some genetically programmed buddy system.

"I had the weirdest dreams while you were gone." Tommy licked his lips. And Baptiste must have been really high, because they shimmered, suddenly full and ripe, jewelled under the intense lights. "I was reprogramming you. I almost had you out of your cell. Out of your body. And then, one time, you were carrying my baby, man."

Tommy's pupils were wide and dark, only the tiniest sliver of tan ringed around the iris. They looked like a cat's eyes, wide and startled, somehow innocent.

"You're really high," whispered Baptiste, aware that they were in each other's arms, in the middle of the dance floor somehow, suddenly, some way, and he wasn't sure how that had happened.

Except they were high. Really high.

"Can bonds change, Baptiste?" He shivered when Tommy said his name. And that was weird. That had never happened before. "Now that I have you here, I don't want to let you go." His arms were around Baptiste's waist. Tommy's arms felt so good. Strong, warm, fierce.

"It doesn't work that way," he said. Or maybe he thought it. Whatever, Tommy would be the one to know, wouldn't he? Codes and programming them was his thing. What did he know, anyway?

Had he reprogrammed them after all? Reprogrammed Baptiste?

Whatever. He didn't believe himself. Nothing had changed. Maybe they were both just too high, but it felt good. Felt better than it ever had before. Stronger. Like they were breathing together.

Like their heart was beating together.

 

\- - -

 

Tommy's heart was pounding in his ears. Their heart, _their heartbeats_. He could feel each beat in his fingertips, across his skin. He wasn't sure if it was his or Baptiste's, but they echoed throughout his body. Each fingerprint, reverberating, thrumming into his bones.

The made it to his sofa, Baptiste walking as if his legs were jello-filled, giggling by turns, and murmuring throatily to Tommy, "I feel good, so free, god, Tommy, I'm so fucking _free_ ," before half-sitting, half-falling onto the arm, his hands around Tommy's waist.

Tommy pushed Baptiste back leaning him nearly across the back of the sofa, and ran his fingers down the side of Baptiste's face. He nuzzled his mouth across Baptiste's chest, up his neck, and along his jaw, taking in each sigh, each twitch, smiling, as Baptiste's arms pulled him closer, his fingers clutching desperately. Finally, Tommy crawled onto the sofa arm, and took his face in both hands. He opened his mouth against Baptiste's lips. Baptiste's eyes were closed, but he opened his mouth, whispering, "Oh, Tommy."

Their lips were hot and even there, Tommy swore he could feel a pulse, like a drum, like a low frequency thrumming. Baptiste's hand came up to cup his jaw, the other hand going to the back of his head. He yanked and they tumbled onto the sofa, Tommy on top of him, between Baptiste's legs.

They were both hard and both so high and he wanted Baptiste so bad. He undid the buttons on Baptiste's shirt and pushed it off of him, running his fingers across firm muscles.

Baptiste turned away. "I'm sorry."

"What?"

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have--I didn't mean to...."

Tommy kissed along Baptiste's jaw, along his neck. "Hey, you don't have to apologise. It wasn't your fault."

Baptiste nodded, then shook his head. "No."

"Baptiste." Tommy slid his fingers into Baptiste's silky soft hair and tugged his face toward his own. "Look at me. It's just us. Now. Just us." Baptiste's eyes opened and he stared at Tommy, blinking once, long and slow like a cat. He smiled, opened his mouth, and reached for Tommy, while one leg hitched over Tommy's hips.

His sobriety began fading as Baptiste's heartbeat kicked into high gear, as Tommy deftly got him out of his jeans--Tommy's borrowed jeans, which suddenly turned him on even more.

"I'm going to fuck you, come on you, then fuck you again."

"Fuck yes," breathed Baptiste.

They were too high to be fucking for sentimentality and it seemed like his final grip on coherence dropped when Baptiste's bare legs wrapped around him and he felt naked skin against him. A hastily rolled on condom kept them slick, and Tommy was afraid he wouldn't last long--not with the sounds Baptiste made, not with the heat of his lithe body twisting under Tommy.

He was trapped in the humid corner of Baptiste's throat, tangled in his hair, smelling alcohol and cigarettes, and the spicy sweet scent of Baptiste's cologne, something he insisted on buying before anything else, and which Tommy would never smell again without getting hard. He open-mouth kissed Baptiste's jaw, slid a hand under his knee, and pushed inside him, capturing his sharp gasp with another kiss.

They went still for a tense moment, Baptiste arched like a bow, taught, Tommy kissing, and stroking him, before he made a quiet moan, almost a sob, a little broken.

"Tommy, oh fuck, Tommy."

The pure _want_ in his voice went straight to Tommy's dick. It felt like permission somehow, and he took it, rocking slowly, pulling out, pushing in, building up until he was fucking Baptiste as promised.

When he pulled out, Baptiste made a whining noise and Tommy laughed, drawing up on his knees. Tommy pulled off the condom. "Open your eyes."

Baptiste could barely keep his eyes open, but he watched, squinting as Tommy covered his dick and stomach in come. Tommy grasped his dick and worked it, hand slick with his come and Baptiste came, crying out, come shooting out to hit Tommy's thigh and belly.

Tommy leaned down to kiss him, hand slick on Baptiste's throat. He fumbled to get another condom on, then fucked Baptiste hard and fast. They collapsed panting. He pushed Baptiste's hair back, holding his face, and closed his eyes, still hard, still inside Baptiste.

 

\- - -

 

Baptiste opened his eyes. There was a subtle sound, like sliding gates, but it must have been a dream, because he was on a large bed, naked, wrapped in thick linen sheets, the soft hum of a fan overhead, wafting cool air, occasionally scented with sweet incense.

He didn't remember getting in bed. He didn't remember getting home.

Tommy was beside him, on his stomach, still sleeping. His back was bare, showing off an elaborate, but muted black tattoo of a winged, dragon-like creature coiled across his upper shoulders and spiralling down his spine. Baptiste traced a wing, his fingers pale against Tommy's skin. Tommy stirred, but didn't wake.

Something was definitely different.

He got up, walked into the kitchen and made a cup of coffee. It was a fancy coffeemaker and Tommy's mom brought him coffee from the island. Like the incense, it had a sweet, amber-like quality, and Baptiste drank it black.

He was staring out door to the balcony when he felt Tommy behind him.

"You can go out there, you know."

Baptiste nodded, a smile playing at his lips, thinking that Tommy thought he was afraid of the sliding door or something. "Ain't got clothes on."

Tommy laughed. "We're high in the sky, man. No one will see. Not even the neighbours. C'mon." He pushed the door open and slightly humid, warm air came in, along with the hazy hum of city and traffic. Birds. Jets.

The balcony wasn't large, but the walls on either side were nearly shoulder high.

"I could fuck you, right here in the sunshine," Tommy spoke over his shoulder. It sounded like a joke, but Tommy wasn't laughing. Baptiste was hard at the thought. So was Tommy. He turned away and looked over the lower balcony wall.

"You might get a sunburn." Tommy winked.

Baptiste set his coffee down and shrugged. "Sometimes I tan. Maybe I'll get freckles on my ass."

"I'd like to see that."

Baptiste laughed and it came out like a giggle. He coughed and tried to cover it up. "Aren't you dating anybody?" It was early, so there wasn't much going on in the street, but he could see shops setting up, the early morning people starting their day. Coffee and breakfast seemed like a really good idea.

Tommy shrugged. "I was seeing a girl. Didn't work out. Tried seeing a guy. Didn't work out, not really."

Baptiste nodded.

"You?"

"I uh, had penpals. My cellmate wasn't my type and I wasn't his. Thankful for the little things, you know?"

Tommy nodded, gazing down at the city. "What is your type?"

Baptiste stared at him, let his eyes trace down the long, lean line of Tommy's body, lit by sunshine. "Not what I thought, apparently."

Tommy turned, his gaze narrowed. "How so?"

"You're my best friend. I thought my parents would pick a partner for me, we'd adopt, and that was that. They were old school poor people, remember?" Baptiste shrugged. "Trying to act fancy, do the high class things. I never thought I'd get a say in the matter."

Tommy didn't say anything, just watched him, with that mild and faintly apprehensive expression. Baptiste swallowed. "Was--was last night as good as it seemed?"

"It was good. You don't remember?" Tommy's face relaxed, but he didn't quite smile.

"C'mon. Last night was a blur. Felt like a dream. Might have _been_ a dream."

"It wasn't."

"I'd like to know for sure. Clarity of sobriety and all."

Tommy's mouth quirked in a crooked, sharp grin. "Risk of sunburn doesn't scare you?"

Baptiste shrugged. "Doing time changes a man. I'm willing to play with fire if you are."

The balcony was small, Tommy took three steps and had his arms around Baptiste.

"I think we've been playing with fire a long time."

 

\- - -end- - -

 


End file.
